DISCLAIMER: All Final Fantasy characters belong to Square, and Pride and Prejudice belongs to Jane Austen.

Finality and Fantasy

CHAPTER I

"It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife..."

The personal sentiments of this particular man are unbeknownst (and, quite honestly, irrelevant) to those individuals who are in want of becoming a wife. The previous assumption regarding the oh-so-obvious wishes of said single man is so deeply ingrained into the minds of those whom wish to be married, wish their daughters to be married, or wish for someone to be married, for Heaven's sake, that they often claim the bachelor as their own even before he is personally acquainted with them or makes his emotions and preference known.

"Godo," said his lady to him one day, her eyes alight with excitement, "Have you heard that the Kalm Park is let at last?"

Godo Kisaragi replied that he had not.

"But it is," replied Elmyra, her tone gentle yet persistent. "Mrs. Ilfana was just here, and she told me all about it!"

Godo did not answer her, instead choosing to stare wistfully at the safe tucked away on the bottom shelf of the bookcase in his study. The ominous black metal box stared back at him. Inside of it were the few trinkets and valuables that represented the little wealth his family possessed - the "family jewels", if you will. Although limited in number, they were most certainly not limited in luster and shine, with a polished gleam so attractive that they appealed to Godo's inner kleptomani--

"Don't you want to know who's moved in?" Elmyra interjected, her usually kind voice taking on a frustrated edge. This was not the first time her husband had drowned out her voice in favor of the mental image of shiny objects. It was a tendency that had become routine over the years, and although it was less surprising, it wasn't less annoying.

"You want to tell me, and I have no objection to hearing it," was Godo's bored reply. This was invitation enough.

"Ilfana has let me know that Kalm Park has officially been rented out by a single, wealthy young man from the north of Nibelheim, and that he came down on Monday in a horse-drawn carriage to see the place... Apparently he liked it! He's supposed to move in sometime before Christmas, you know, and some of his servants are apparently going to start setting the place up by the end of the week!" Elmyra smiled at her husband enthusiastically. The news was the talk of the town, the latest and hottest gossip, and with four daughters either ready to be married or nearly at the age to do so, it was the most exciting bit of knowledge she'd heard in months.

Godo's interest peaked. "What is his name?"

"Strife."

"Is he married or single?"

The spark of excitement in Elmyra's eyes glowed brighter. "Single, my dear! And quite wealthy, too - about four or five thousand a year! Can you imagine? Why, what a fine thing for one of our girls! You must go visit him once he's moved in, and make his acquaintance so we can introduce our daughters to him!"

"I'm sure you can go alone, Elmyra," replied Godo, stifling a yawn. "After all, I'm sure Mr. Strife would be much obliged to see you. I see no need for me to come. In fact - if you'd be so kind - " he smiled winningly at his wife (it did not work). " - you can pass him a few lines for me. Let him know I bid him my welcome, and that he can marry whichever one of our daughters that he wants. Though you must throw in a good word for Yuffie."

Elmyra sighed wanly. "I'm not going to do that, Godo," she replied firmly. "Yuffie's no better than the others - Aeris is blatantly much more beautiful, and Priscilla* more good-humored. You must stop playing favorites, Godo, it's just not fair -"

" - They're no better than her," retorted Godo, cutting his wife off. "Aeris may be slightly more graceful - " (This was an understatement. The eldest daughter was more graceful by far, with an ethereal air about her) " - But for the most part, they're both silly and ignorant, like all girls, Yuffie included. But she has something else - a certain quickness about her that they lack."

And she was quick indeed, he mused. Quick in every sense of the word: quick-witted, with a sharp tongue that could cut like the sharpened edge of a lethal weapon from the Orient; physically quick, having outrun all of the village children when they played games in her youth; and most importantly, Godo thought, quick-fingered, with a slight of hand that could make any thief immensely proud. Yes, it was with his second-eldest daughter that Godo had most in common with (namely a love of shiny objects), and it was the commonality they shared that made her his favorite daughter as well as his most annoying daughter. It could be argued that Godo's incentive for favoring Yuffie when it came to marriage prospects was not because she was his favorite daughter, but because he wanted her to get out of his house as soon as possible so she would stop driving him stark raving mad. Elmyra knew this. She didn't know and, quite frankly, did not care which one it was, her innate maternal instinct towards all of her offspring overriding any sense of favoritism she had (Although, one could note, she seemed to have a consistent inclination towards her eldest daughter, Aeris).

As it were, her goals weren't even on the cusp of beginning to be achieved if her husband didn't appease her by going to call on Mr. Strife as soon as he moved into Kalm Park. She continued to press him, now bordering on desperation. Time for a new approach, she thought. "Godo, you don't know the suffering you inflict upon me by limiting our girls the way you do."

Godo's ineffable laziness won out over his wife's oh-so-dreadful suffering. "You'll get over it," he said, flatly. Elmyra gritted her teeth, beginning to lose her infallible lady-like composure. "And you'll see fifty other young men with five thousand a year come through Kalm. Fifty, I wager. Fifty."

Elmyra sniffed miserably and stared at her husband. "It doesn't matter if fifty come. It doesn't matter if one-hundred come, because you won't visit any of them and we'll be kicked out of Longbourne with four spinster daughters whose beauty and charms were wasted because YOU couldn't muster up the nerve to go visit any of their possible husbands," she concluded, depressed.

Godo looked at her with a twinkle in his eye. "I assure you, my dear wife, when there are fifty young bachelors in Kalm I will visit all of them," he promised, crossing his heart in a mocking fashion.

His wife sighed in frustration and dejectedly walked out of the family study. Her sole mission in life was to get her daughters married, and underneath her genteel nature and inclination to spoil her daughters was a harsh streak of determination to get them out of their home at the Longbourne Estate and on the alter at the nearest church. In the meantime, however, she made her way to the parlor to bemoan her husband's negligence to his daughters, whom she hoped would have some helpful input as to how she could motivate him into visiting the seemingly promising Mr. Strife at his estate.

A/N: Well, there you have it. Chapter one! I'm going to try to chapter this just like Austen's original text, although I'll probably wind up combining some chapters with others. Although I do intend for this fanfic to be long, I'll be simplifying some aspects of the original novel and tweaking them so they fit with the FF7 characters and so that this story remains a piece of fanfiction and not a novel in itself. I'm currently a student in college, but I should be able to find the time to update regularly... I'd like to see this finished by the end of the year (knowing me, that's probably quite ambitious). I'm hoping I won't lose motivation or interest in it, considering that the idea of this story itself was conceived when I was sick and fighting off a fever and therefore delusional... let's hope my inspiration persists even when I'm in good health. :P

ALSO - Priscilla is not an OC. IN FACT, she's actually in the game - she's the girl that Cloud performs CPR on after the party saves her from some monster. She's the Dolphin girl in Junon. REMEMBER?! I'm using her as Lydia Bennett because she's young and annoying, and I'm saving the other younger female characters for later (namely Shelke and Marlene). But yes, she's not an OC, she's an original character from the game - just in case you didn't recognize her.

Also, as I mentioned in the summary, this story will inevitably wind up as a Vincent x Yuffie and a Cloud x Aeris story. Don't like it, don't read it. :)

Comments and criticism welcomed, please review!